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Media heroes are everywhere: journalists, activists, media innovators and educators making sure that we all have access to media that supports democratic values of justice, community and respect. Some media heroes are solitary voices keeping a candle of truth burning through a period of darkness. Others are organizers expanding the range of people who can wield the power of publishing and broadcasting, or critics revealing the hidden aspects of media all around us.

Our 21 full-color trading cards are a fun and informative way to celebrate beloved media heroes such as Bill Moyers and Democracy Now!, and to learn about lesser-known heroes like Richie Pérez and Florynce Kennedy. A fantastic teaching tool for students, or a perfect stocking stuffer for friends, family or budding media activists. Cards feature original art by Michael Leavitt and mini-biographies of our heroes.

Special holiday Stocking Stuffer pricing:
1 set for $10 postage paid; or buy 2 sets and get a third set free.

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MediaHeroes

With righteous anger matched by a sharp and often foul-mouthed wit, Flo Kennedy modeled creative, radical resistance for generations of feminists. As a young attorney, Kennedy handled the estates of Billie Holiday and Charlie Parker, exposing record companies’ racist exploitation of successful black artists. In 1966, while most progressive activists were focused on the Vietnam War, Kennedy set up The Media Workshop to expose and fight racism and oppression in the American media.

From 1912 until his death in 1939, Heywood Broun was an immensely popular newspaper columnist, writing news, commentary, sports and literary criticism for a number of New York newspapers and wire services. Married to feminist writer Ruth Hale, Broun believed that journalists had both the power and the responsibility to combat social injustices. His crusading articles often championed the causes of working people, and railed against bigotry and racial prejudice. Hoping to improve journalists’ working conditions, pay and sense of professional dignity, Broun founded the first union for journalists in 1933.

In the late 1960s, Joan Ganz Cooney and a few likeminded collaborators sought a new, creative way to connect with children using television. The Children’s Television Workshop wanted to avoid the segregation of education from entertainment, and to create a programming environment in which young viewers would be safe from commercial manipulation by advertisers. Finally, they wanted to prioritize serving audiences of nonwhite and lower-income children. Grittily urban, multicultural and kid-safe, Sesame Street was CTW’s first and most celebrated result.

Hosted by award-winning investigative journalists Amy Goodman and Juan Gonzalez, Democracy Now! has become an indispensable part of the American media landscape. The Pacifica Network’s hour-long daily news program prides itself on being the fruit of a broad, ongoing collaboration, drawing upon the work of a large number of independent journalists and community media outlets. Founded in 1996 as an election-year project at WBAI, the program quickly became Pacifica’s most essential investigative news program.

Escaping from slavery at the age of 20, Frederick Douglass rose to become one of the most effective and righteous moral voices of all time. He was inspired by abolitionist activist and journalist William Lloyd Garrison to begin speaking out against slavery, and began writing for Garrison’s newspaper The Liberator. Douglass was a natural communicator, and a powerful public speaker; his autobiography became an international bestseller in 1845.

Founded by former journalist and civil rights lawyer Jeff Cohen, media watch group Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting has set the standard for media criticism based on democratic values rather than on partisan positions. Tracking media practices that marginalize women, people of color, and voices of dissent, FAIR critiques media bias, inaccuracies, and omissions—and mobilizes a community of activists to hold media outlets accountable.

In four decades as a filmmaker, teacher, and international communications rights activist, DeeDee Halleck has helped place new technologies—from home video and cable television to Internet journalism and digital satellite broadcasting—in the hands of social movements and regular folks. Along the way, she has inspired generations of grassroots media activists, and helped found a string of creative grassroots media initiatives.

During World War II, pacifist Lew Hill hatched a radical idea with a number of fellow conscientious objectors. Frustrated by the marginalization of critical voices in broadcast media, they resolved to launch their own radio station—a station which could increase peace and justice by creating opportunities for thoughtful public discussion of diverse ideas. After the war, Hill and his friends formed the Pacifica Foundation, and in 1949 launched KPFA as the country's first listener-supported radio station.

In 1999, grassroots journalists, anti-globalization organizers and international tech activists launched a bold experiment: a grassroots media effort to cover the World Trade Organization ministerial in Seattle, and the protests that would shut it down. The Independent Media Center website easily surpassed mainstream media coverage of the epochal event, documenting police aggression in the streets alongside in-depth analysis of the harms caused by deregulated global capitalism.

Jean Kilbourne pioneered the critical study of images of women in advertising and the use of media literacy for public health and prevention. Her work examines how a media landscape saturated with visions of idealized female beauty produces illusions of personal inadequacy, sexual objectification of women and girls, and violence against women. In 1969 she began lecturing on these topics, and has never stopped, traveling widely and inspiring many educators to follow her example of unflinching critique.

The media's job is to interest the public in the public interest. -John Dewey

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